- Former National Security Advisor, John Bolton said Russian President Vladimir Putin doesn't take Trump seriously, according to a clip of an interview with ABC News' Martha Raddatz.
- "I think Putin thinks he can play him like a fiddle," Bolton said.
- Bolton also said that Trump was uninterested in learning and reading about foreign affairs.
- The interview is meant to promote Bolton's new tell-all book "The Room Where It Happened: A White House Memoir."
- The book is set to be released on June 23, but the Trump administration has sued Bolton claiming it has classified information.
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Former national security advisor John Bolton said Russian President Vladimir Putin does not consider US President Donald Trump as a "serious adversary."
"I think Putin thinks he can play him like a fiddle," Bolton told ABC News' Martha Raddatz. "I think Putin is smart, tough. I think he sees that he's not faced with a serious adversary here. I don't think he's worried about Donald Trump."
.@MarthaRaddatz: “How would you describe Trump's relationship with Vladimir Putin?”
— ABC News (@ABC) June 17, 2020
John Bolton: “I think Putin thinks he can play him like a fiddle.”
Watch more from the exclusive interview this Sunday at 9|8c on ABC. pic.twitter.com/VALmx3Z0f0
Trump's relationship with Russia and Putin has been scrutinized since the 2016 presidential campaign. Former special counsel Robert Mueller found that Russia worked to get Trump elected, though his investigation did not find enough evidence to suggest that Russia coordinated with the Trump campaign. Trump has repeatedly praised Putin and Russia and spoken in favor of Russia, saying he trusted Putin's word over US intelligence agencies over Russian meddling in the election. Trump has also supported Putin being allowed to rejoin the G7 among other overtures of support for Putin.
Earlier on Wednesday, The New York Times, Washington Post, and Wall Street Journal published excerpts from Bolton's tell-all book "The Room Where It Happened: A White House Memoir."
Bolton made a number of shocking claims about Trump in his book, including alleging that Trump asked Chinese President Xi Jinping to help him with the 2020 election and that he called all journalists "scumbags" that should be executed.
The former national security advisor, who refused to testify in the House of Representatives' impeachment hearings also accused the House of committing "impeachment malpractice." He alleged that Trump had engaged in significantly more impeachable conduct than just what he was ultimately impeached over.
In his interview with Raddatz, Bolton was also critical of Trump's handling and knowledge of foreign affairs and the way he deals with other leaders.
He added that while Putin has spent his life understanding Russia's political standing in the world, Trump is uninterested in reading or learning about global issues and that puts America in a "very difficult" position.
"Well, the president may well be a superb dealmaker when it comes to Manhattan real estate," Bolton said. "Dealing with arms limitation treaties on strategic weapons, dealing in many, many international other security issues are things far removed from his life experience."
The ABC News interview is meant to promote his book which is expected to be released on June 23.
On Tuesday, the Trump administration sued Bolton alleging he broke his contract by backing out of the National Security Council's ongoing vetting process to determine whether his book contains classified information that needs to be redacted or edited.
The NSC "quickly identified significant quantities of classified information that it asked Defendant to remove," the complaint said. "An iterative process between NSC Staff and Defendant then began, as required by the binding agreements he signed, with changes to the book and other information being securely passed between Defendant and NSC staff. Soon, though, Defendant apparently became dissatisfied at the pace of NSC's review."
The suit alleges Bolton "decided to take matters into his own hands," instead of waiting for the process to conclude.
However, legal experts have said that administration efforts to prevent him from releasing the book would likely be unsuccessful.
"This attempt by the Trump administration to block the publication of John Bolton's memoir is doomed to fail," the American Civil Liberties Union said in a statement after the lawsuit was filed.
The White House did not immediately respond to Business Insider's request for comment.
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